The Stapleton schools have a special provision beginning in the 2017-18 school year where they will be adding a new subject matter to the curriculum. The area schools have decided to begin teaching a Sales/Fundraising course to help continue the local schools mission of raising as much money as possible to support the schools’ other core classes. “As of now, we will just be implementing it in the elementary schools,” said Denver Superintendent Tom Boasberg. “The parents in the community and the schools have been asking for this for a few years now, and we decided to give this a shot.” The focus of the class will be to help kids understand basic sales and presentation skills, which will help them with existing fundraisers such as Jump Rope for Heart and Girl Scout cookie sales, but the kids will now branch out into direct fundraising efforts for their particular schools. “The kids seem to have better success asking for money from adults than adults do,” admitted Swigert PTA leader Sylvia Baird. “So, why not put them out there to raise the funds we need to make sure we are doing the best we can to teach them the core subjects.”

School leaders are behind the idea. “This just seems like the logical next step,” said Westerly Creek parent Mark Wilson. “When parents contact people asking for a donation or sponsorship to the school, it is much easier for adults to say know to an adult. But, put a cute little kid on that call or on that doorstep, well, that’s a much tougher situation to say no to.” Bill Roberts parent Katie Noelting agrees. “We have done a pretty good job fundraising historically, but that’s not to say we can’t get better. There are only so many parents willing to take on this effort, so when we put a whole army of trained kids out there in the community and contacting their loved ones, well, we could see a 30-40% spike in our fundraising efforts.” The schools plan to use a traditional sales textbook and each school will have a dedicated sales teacher. The teachers have not been hired yet, but schools say role playing will be an important part of the class. “If the classes are successful at the elementary level, we will try them out at the secondary level, and possibly even across all Denver schools,” said Boasberg. Be ready to open those wallets, Stapletonians.